


Jojo's Bizarre Adventure: Shadowed Suspicion Volume III

by arcanedreamer



Series: Jojo's Bizarre Adventure: Shadowed Suspicion [3]
Category: Buffy the Vampire Slayer, ジョジョの奇妙な冒険 | JoJo no Kimyou na Bouken | JoJo's Bizarre Adventure
Genre: Action/Adventure, Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Crossover, Gen, Spoilers
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-07-11
Updated: 2015-02-20
Packaged: 2018-03-03 14:16:07
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 17
Words: 18,654
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/2853827
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/arcanedreamer/pseuds/arcanedreamer
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Buffy the Vampire Slayer is the story of the Slayer. In the words of Giles, "Into every generation is born a chosen one... she alone will stand against the vampires, the demons and the forces of darkness. She is the Slayer." People like Giles were the Watchers, the English mentors of the Slayers. At least...that was the story.<br/>Buffy found a way to unlock the sleeping power within all Potential future Slayers, and now the Slayers are many. Those who survived the last battle helped to form the next Watcher's Council.<br/>Investigation of a certain stone mask sparks inquiries into the history of the ancient vampire relic, and some surprise discoveries are made along the way, including that of another legendary line of vampire hunters.<br/>Xander must deal with the aftermath of the trial, as well as with his mysterious “rescuer”...</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Lotus Juice

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Xander wakes up and realizes that Fitz has, depending on one's point of view, 'kidnapped' or 'rescued' him.

            Xander begins to stir, and finally opens his eyes. Honestly, he feels a little bit groggy. So, who was the Big Bad this time?  
            Okay, he's more tired than he thought, because nothing's coming. He's just about to close his eyes and seek his answers in his dreams-or at least more clarity when he wakes up after-when he sees the face looming above his own. It's not Dawn, or Willow, or Buffy, or even maybe Giles. It's...  
            Right, that Fitz guy. The Big Bad had supposedly been him, that scene where they pull off the rubber vampire mask and it just happens to be a Xander underneath. Weird image, but his brain's not properly working, and they've established this, let's move on. Trial, mask, dreams...bookstore. Rescue?  
            It's not a hallucination, because the guy's wearing different clothes—a denim jacket, jeans, and a button up shirt. And a different hat. How many hats does this guy own anyway? It should be casual, but it sort of isn't. Somehow, he seems more formal than he had at the bookstore.  
            Xander sits up quickly enough that his head swims and backs up until his head bangs into the headboard, which doesn't help the headache.  
            "Mr. Joestar?" The guy looks somewhat shocked that someone was a little leery about being around an absolute lunatic.  
            Everything he's seen or read suggests that he should just go along with it for now, especially if the guy turns out to be violent.  Unfortunately, his brain isn't always fast enough to communicate with his mouth, because all too quickly the "That's not my name" comes from his lips before he has a chance to snatch back the words. But then he finishes processing what happened, and he lurches back at the man, just the way he came, in a desperate attempt to get to the door, because Buffy Willow Giles I saw them fall I don't even know where I am but I have to get to them, I have to make sure they're okay, I have to—  
            He's tackled, his breath rushing out in an emphatic whoomph. His captor turns him over and pins his struggling hands, still leaning heavily on him. The man begins speaking slowly, uncertainly. He's patient, but this reaction, Xander guesses, was not exactly one of the ones he'd anticipated. "I'm not going to hurt you. My family has been friends with yours for generations..."  
            "Yeah? Tell that to my friends. You killed them!" He doesn't realize he's screaming at first, barely able to see through the tears in his eyes and the fog in his mind, because this? This is all a bad dream. This can't be happening. It isn't real.  
            The man winces and quickly shakes his head. "I didn't kill them! I just knocked them out! I...I thought you needed a rescue. They didn't seem like your friends...didn't seem very friendly..." He's reduced to muttering, which doesn't bode well for his captive's survival.  
            "You're just a random crazy stalker," Xander hisses. His brain seems to have gotten stuck on angry mode, and is ignoring all signals saying 'don't tick off the potential crazy kidnapper'.  
            "I was trying to help!" the man yells back. The tears in his eyes and the sincerity in his voice almost make Xander guilty. Almost. "And I promise I didn't kill them. On...on my mother's soul, all right? It was just a rescue, not a slaughter. You're a Joestar. I thought I had to step in."  
            "What are you talking about? I told you, my name..." he begins, but doesn't get to finish. Fitz regains his certainty and plunges forward.  
            "I know what you told me, but you don't have to lie to me. You are a Joestar. You have the birthmark."  
            "Birthmark? What birthmark? I don't have a birthma..." Xander trails off, staring at the hand mirror Fitz is holding up. There's a star on his shoulder that he's never seen before. "What did you do to me?" He's prodding at his shoulder, thinking that maybe it's a tattoo or ink or something, but it's staying stubbornly put, and there's no pain. He's been told tattoos are painful right after, but that wasn't going to deter Jesse. He, on the other hand, took both that and the wisdom that they look cool right now but eventually will look stupid when gravity gets the upper hand and lost all interest.  
            "I didn't do anything. You...you don't know?" The hopeful glance is beginning to get to Xander. This man practically worships the Joestars, but...he's crazy, isn't he? Sure, maybe Jessica Harris had some secrets, but she wasn't anything special. If she had been, she would've had the strength to stand up to his dad, and he would've been more capable than just some normal guy getting mixed up in all this craziness. "Maybe I can refresh your memory," he decided, which instantly had warning shivers running up Xander's spine.  
            "I...no, thanks, I'll be fine, I don't...." Xander tried to say, but Fitz isn't listening.  
            "Lotus Juice!" Fitz calls, then waits expectantly, as if waiting for Xander to come to an epiphany. "Well?" The only thing Xander's realized is that this guy is insane.  
            "I should go make sure my friends are..." he begins, but again, he's interrupted.  
            "It's not safe!" the guy exclaims, wide-eyed and...worried? "...I'll make you stay here until it's safe," he decides.  
            Xander really, really doesn't like the sound of that. He's still a crazy-magnet, he decides, and even if this guy had killed his friends, he might not necessarily know about it, which should have his pity even though a burst of white hot anger builds in his chest. And he thinks he sees something shadowy move out of the corner of his eye. It's not big enough to be human, and the weird shape reminds him somewhat of one of the smaller demons they've fought. He turns his head to look, but...  
            Water hits him in the face. He blinks to see the guy holding a cup. And then he blinks some more, as unnatural exhaustion suddenly seeps into his bones. No, he can't...he can't let this...are his friends...  
            He falls, reaching out a hand for reality, but the trapdoor snaps shut, and he's left in the dark  
            And then suddenly, he's in that peaceful garden again, bare feet in the grass. The sakura trees have stopped blooming, it means something even if he doesn't know what  
            He's facing the door, and a voice echoes, pleasant, welcoming, but it's also sheathed steel.  
_Walk forward into the future, walk forward without hesitation, open the door. But if you do, you cannot look back._  
            He knows the voice. It's vaguely familiar, and he thinks he's heard it before, a lifetime ago, but he can't place it, even though he feels like he knows it as well as Buffy's or Willow's.  
            And even though it doesn't state it full out, he knows what it means. If he takes these steps, if he opens this door, looking back will only bring him sorrow. It will only bring regrets, acidic, eating at his soul. Because as strange as it seems, this door is important, and opening it is a decision that is not to be taken lightly. If he opens the door, it will change everything, even if he doesn't understand how, or why it's so important, or any of it.  
            He pauses for one short eternal second, just to let the weight of the decision sink in. He already knows what his answer is.  
            His friends are in danger, even if Fitz hadn't killed them. He doesn't know how he knows this, but he feels it deeply, instinctively, below the level of thought. The same instinct tells him that he has the power to stop that, to save them. He just needs to reach deep inside for that power.  
            He breathes deeply and walks forward those few steps, suddenly echoing in a way that doesn't make sense for a Japanese garden, and suddenly he's standing in front of a mansion, footfalls echoing on the stone. It's as familiar as the garden, and yet he's never seen it before in his life, either.  
            He walks up to one of the great wooden doors, gently rubs his hand over a few of the panels he can reach. He doesn't understand why he suddenly feels sad, but doesn't pause to examine the feeling. There's no time for it now. These are the same doors, even though they look nothing alike. He takes another deep breath and turns the knob, opening the door.  
            He doesn't get too much of a glimpse of what's behind it, only a burst of light that blinds him for a moment...  
            His eye springs open.


	2. The Pretender

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Xander finds his power to fight, and the battle commences in earnest.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I knew I was forgetting something. Two very important somethings, in fact. 1. I'm aware that Foo Fighters is an already existing Stand, but Sensei assures me that this isn't the first time that a band has been used for multiple Stands. More importantly, Pretender, like the opening and ending credits, just presented himself and wouldn't go away, so we're all stuck with him. 2. We're running out of Ora alternatives, so I ended up using Tora, Japanese for 'tiger' or 'attack'. I have absolutely no idea what Bye Bye Beautiful's going to get.  
> Finally, more Stand stuff (Stand battle go!). Fitz will be explaining what Stands are in the story soon. Feel free to ask questions about the Pretender, though I can't promise I can answer them. I'll go through the next chapter, and then it'll probably be a picture of Pretender. I don't want to release the Jojo's Stand stats until we've seen more of their abilities. The Pretender does have limitations, but those will be revealed in-story as well.  
> As usual, feedback is appreciated.

            Fitz is staring at him in astonishment. "How did you...?"  
            He couldn't see it before, but he can see it now—there's the weird shape from earlier behind his kidnapper. He still can't make it out completely clearly, but it's no longer shadowy. Whatever hiding it's doing, it's its own doing.  
            It's floating in midair, and he can see water-like ripples, even though there's no actual water there. And as if he was viewing water from a distance, he can't actually see what was underneath, just a glimpse of something greenish poking out, and a really pearlescent tip of something else that...well, Xander assumed to be a shell. It's what it looked like anyway, but judging by the way it keeps moving and the weird water-like air appearance keeps moving, maybe that isn't what it is at all. It's really hard to tell.  
            He can't worry about that too much. He has to fight back while he can. The name comes to him easily. "Pretender!" he yells, a strange accent to his voice that he can't remember having ever used before, and then he's not alone. He can feel a presence behind him, a familiar presence that's been watching out for him for a little while now. He's not entirely certain what he's supposed to do next, but...  
 _Believe._ Yeah, consciously he's terrified and he's got no idea what he's doing, but underneath, where it's instinct and action and not conscious thought, he's been doing this in his dreams. Except he doesn't want to kill the guy, who as far as he can tell isn't a vampire.  
            "Even if you didn't kill them, you hurt my friends, and that's not really a good idea. Ever." His voice is trembling, but there's steel in his eyes. This is one fight he's not going to back down from.  
            "I don't want to hurt you, Mr. Joestar." Neither of them really want to fight, exactly. And no, neither of them want to hurt the other, despite the fire in Xander's heart. But neither can he just walk away from this. He can apologize later, after he's won but not killed the other guy.  
            Something long and dripping with non-existent water flies out of the water at him. Xander stumbles back, suddenly remembering that oh, yeah, there's a bed behind him, and suddenly the weird thing that was associated with him was in front of him. The Pretender, didn't he call him?  
            It's humanoid, unlike whatever Fitz summoned. As far as Xander can tell, that is. The Pretender is...something even one of the Scoobies has never seen the like of before. That's armor, probably, judging by the exact shininess of it, and those are weird metallic wrap boots, and there's a lot of spiky armor parts, but that's definitely not a helm or whatever else goes with armor.  
            The greenish thing wraps around Pretender's arms, which he's crossed in front of the both of them to protect them. It scrabbles a little, trying to get through the armor, and when that doesn't work pulls upwards and stabs a little at the hands. For whatever reason, Pretender doesn't happen to be wearing actual gauntlets, either. They're more...metallic wraps. The tendril or tentacle or whatever it is happens to be sharp, and while it can't get through plate armor or whatever the equivalent of that is in weird spirit-person terms is, it can get through the metallic wraps. He hears a grunt.  
            Then his own hands begin to bleed, and Xander grits his teeth. It hurts, but he's definitely had worse, so he's not complaining or waving a little white napkin on a pencil just yet. "So, if you hurt that guy, it hurts me too. Good to know, thanks for that tip."  
            With a roar, Pretender pulls at the tentacle. It's cutting slightly further into the hands, but it also pulls the thing that's hiding out of its water environment. "I'll bet you don't particularly like being landed, do you, little fella?" The little squeal assures him that this is probably the case.  
            He closes his eye, reaches back to another dream...  
he points at a guy with pink hair and moves his hat from one side to the other, he means business  
this stuff isn't really relevant, skip it  
there we go, blocking the other's attacks and  
flurry of blows  
            "Torararararara!" He's got no clue what it means. He's not even sure how he's doing it, but suddenly Pretender's copying the same flurry of blows, and he can't see past the red fists flying.  
            "Well, it's good that you at least have some idea of how to use your Stand, Mr. Joestar. But you've messed up." It's probably not a good thing that Fitz sounds smug, now.  
            Finally he can see, and he understands exactly why. This definitely didn't do the same damage as in the dream. One long, plant-like tendril is oozing mucous and hanging limply, and the one that was around Pretender's wrists was completely broken by the blows, but the rest of the creature withdrew into the shell. It looks a bit like a snail's shell, aside from the seaside shininess. "It's true that Lotus Juice is more vulnerable when fully visible, but that's exactly why he has the shell. And your Stand doesn't appear to be the strongest."  
            The voice isn't coming from...Fitz has moved. Xander resists the urge to wildly glance around; he knows he doesn't have that much time....  
            Come on, Pretender, you've got a big bag of tricks. Show me what you've got, he thinks desperately.  
            Back to fighting Shredder Head Man. No, not him, actually. The ugly undead guy in the tunnel. And there's water, or at least water-like stuff here, and whatever I...no, the other guy...was using was pretty effective in the water...  
            He breathes in deeply, focusing an absurd amount of energy on something that if it didn't work was probably going to lose him the fight. His fist suddenly moves, catching a hand coming at him. Fitz was coming at him from his bad side, and somehow he realized he was there.  
            He feels a moment of triumph before he realizes that his hand is still slippery from the blood, and so he can't keep ahold of it for long. Lotus Juice, meanwhile, with a happy chirrup falls back into its pool of 'water'. It moves with it, okay...and I have the feeling he's planning a counterattack now.  
            What have I gotten myself into?


	3. Budding Friendship

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> The fight finishes, and Fitz comes to his senses.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Sorry about the cliffhanger, but given the pattern of word length I've established for chapters there was no real good place to stop in that section. I'm also going to post pictures of the Pretender and Lotus Juice, so it'll probably be a little longer before the cliffhanger gets resolved. I'll probably have Pretender first, as I actually have that one done, and I haven't figured out how to draw Lotus Juice exactly yet. (Warning: I'm no artist.)  
> I'll probably have the JJBA-style stats when more of the powers of each Stand have been revealed further than just a few moves in a fight, unless I get comments saying readers want the stats sooner.

            When he glances at Fitz, the man seems just as surprised as him. "You're starting to really get hurt. And you've shown you're no stranger to combat, but if we keep up the fisticuffs, you're going to get hurt. Surrender now, and I can tend to your wounds." If nothing else, this man has shown absolutely nothing but concern for him, and yet...  
            If he'd shown this much reluctance to use anything to even seriously wound, let alone anything lethal, then he was possibly telling the truth. The closest he came was that razor-sharp...tentacle-like appendage, and that had been a warning to get him to stop.  
            "Sometimes, it'd be nice to be less stubborn." The comment is only about half to the man, if that. "You sound like you really admire my family. Well, if you want to work with me, you need to learn some things. I don't take orders well, even if they're important and from people who probably know better than me. I don't just sit by idly, and I hate feeling useless. I'm not about to surrender—at least, not yet. This is just a little blood." Years ago, it would've been a bluff, said with a smile that barely conceals the grimace of pain. Compared to the pain of having an eye stabbed out with a thumb, though, this is nothing.  
            Fitz's eyes are solemn, grim, but he nods without protest. With the free hand Xander can't quite reach, he pulls out a water bottle and lets it fall to the floor. Xander's grip is already slipping, and he hurriedly attempts to prevent whatever the other is planning by kicking at the other leg, but he loses his balance and half-falls into Fitz. The two of them topple to the floor, but Fitz manages to kick the bottle toward where the half-submerged tentacled thing is waiting. Whatever Fitz had been planning to do with that water, it works, as Xander hears a happy gurgle and then the sound of tearing plastic.  
            There's a sound that reminds Xander somewhat of a fountain before his vision goes hazy. He feels nauseous and dizzy and is somewhat glad he isn't standing, since his grip goes slack and he's pretty sure he would've fallen if he'd been standing. That's the last thing he needs.  
can't lose won't lose  
but you better hurry it up 'cause I don't think I can do much more  
flashes of punches augmented by light and monsters practically melting  
only can't use it as is because he's not a vampire, I think, and I don't want to seriously hurt him. Yet. If they are dead, there's no mercy in this world that can save him  
            "Golden Mercy Sunlit Strike!" Again, the name just comes to him, and then he's placing his palm over his assailant's heart and lightly breathes, letting the energy flow out. Fitz suddenly falls limp underneath him, which is somewhat worrisome, but the breathing doesn't disappear, so he hasn't killed the guy. Good, because he has no idea of what he just did.  
            Somehow, he manages to stagger upright, even though he's fairly certain he's going to throw up any minute, and glances over to where the other two had been fighting. The water and tentacles have disappeared as if they were a mere dream; Pretender meets his gaze and nods wearily before fading as well. Xander has two more seconds of consciousness to consider what exactly had happened before he topples face forward into the bed, out cold.

            When he wakes up, he can feel gentle hands wrapping his own with cloth. Instantly his eye springs open, and he sees an apologetic Fitz. It's a complete change from his earlier attitude, even if Xander can't quite put his finger on what's changed just yet. "I healed you with Lotus Juice already, but I'm somewhat new to using him, so the gashes aren't completely gone. So I'm wrapping the wounds. You should be able to take it off in a few days."  
            Xander nods, not feeling ready to speak just yet. The nausea has left, but his stomach feels a little hollow, which isn't much of an improvement. And he's still light-headed. How long has it been since he ate or drank?  
            "What I used on you with the water bottle was stronger than what I used on your friends. It should have worn off. That's faster than normal, but I used Lotus Juice to heal you, too, which makes a difference..." Fitz tied off the binding as he spoke. "I woke up a little while ago, and while you were out and I was healing you I had a little time to think. I thought I had the entire situation scoped out, but obviously I didn't know everything."  
            Xander smiles at that comment despite himself.  
            "I...I can understand if you want nothing else to do with me. But I want you to know, too, that I'm not lying." He's holding out a phone, now, which Xander stares at quizzically. He's still a little exhausted.  
            "What's..." His throat is parched, and it comes out more of a croak. He pauses, clears his throat, and tries again. "What's that for?"  
            "I thought you'd like to call your friends, make sure they're fine. I mean, I'm not going to force you to stay here, so you could go in person, but it's probably safer to call. I'm not your boss, though, so..."  
            Xander grins in delight, taking the phone in shaking hands. His fingers auto-dial. It's a good thing he had this number memorized, because he keeps yawning and isn't sure how long he can actually stay conscious.  
            Soon enough, he hears a voice. "Hello?" It's Dawn. She's tired, a little wary, but cheerful. If there's anyone that would be a gibbering wreck if anything horrible—irreversible— had happened to any of them, it would be Dawn, so he can assume that they're all okay, if a little battered. He smiles and is about to greet her with some goofy remark or quip when a foreboding slams into him with the weight of a speeding freight train. The smile slips, and he nearly falls backwards in the bed. If he says a word, they're in danger. He's not sure where the certainty came from, what it means, but it's here and it's not going away. "Hello? Who's there?" Dawn's suspicious now, and not without reason.  
            Instantly he replaces the phone, breathing heavily.


	4. Xander's Stand

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> A picture of Xander's Stand, created by me again in Champions Online then edited by me through Photoshop.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Fitz will explain Stands as soon as Xander lets him get in a word edgewise. Also after I figure out how exactly to make Lotus Juice. I've got the main body, shell and all, but patterning is troublesome...  
> Eventually I'll get Icon working, so we can have more dynamic/posing shots, and maybe even different backgrounds! (Of course, only for the humanoid Stands, but still.)


	5. Fitz's Stand

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Picture of Fitz's Stand, which may I add was very difficult to draw for someone who doesn't draw. ;) I...probably should've added 'water' for it to float in. Maybe when I actually get to the picture that details the Stand's powers.


	6. Bloody Road Mystery

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Xander learns a little more about what's happened to his friends since he last saw them and earns a new ally.

            There's a concerned voice behind him. Fitz. "What is it? What's wrong?"  
            What's wrong is the...the Stone Mask. He knew it was up to something. Who ended up stealing it? Because if it wasn't him, then...  
            "Turn on the TV." They're in a hotel room, right? At least it looks like one. In which case, as a Watcher, he's been in plenty, and aside from a few in Africa, there's been a TV in most he's stayed in.  
            The Fitz of before would've argued. This one doesn't hesitate, even as a blond eyebrow raises in question.  
            "The news," he elaborates. It's odd to watch the tension drain, since he hadn't even realized he noticed it build, but...what, did Fitz think they had someone listening in? He still complies without a word, which is almost as weird as the earlier behavior.  
            It takes the bookstore worker a little while to find what Xander's looking for, but once he does Xander swallows heavily, sitting down on the bed without even realizing what he's doing.  
            "Police are still investigating the cause of the commotion three days ago..." a newscaster announces, as the camera pans over a square that looks like it's been transplanted from the nearest warzone. The damage to the environment reminds Xander uncomfortably of the last time he'd ever seen Sunnydale, buried under the rubble and the collapse of the Hellmouth, and he shivers. With half the nearby buildings in ruin, dents in the concrete street, parts of an iron fence ripped out of the ground, and vegetation and trees ripped out of the middle, park-like area that seems to be everywhere in England, it's pretty clear that people with superstrength were using the area as a stage for their personal grudges...or worse. He ends up taking deep breaths to calm his racing heart. Okay...yeah, so that dark brownish red stuff on parts of the concrete probably isn't paint left by some graffiti artist, like he wishes it was, but they'd probably use words stronger than 'commotion' if they'd found a body or bodies. At least, probably. Then again, the British really were kings and queens of understatement, if Giles was any indication, so who knew? They'd probably have to watch more.  
            Fitz comes to sit beside him, appearing hesitant, like he has no idea how to comfort anyone. Given how awkward Giles is, Xander wouldn't honestly be too surprised if that was another British trait. "Is that..."  
            "Shh." This isn't much to base any conclusions on, which is why he has to hear the narrator lady.  
            "Blood was found at the scene, and it is being analyzed by the nearest laboratory." Uh-oh. That doesn't bode well if they want to keep being a super-secret organization, but that's not the most troubling thing here. "Preliminary results indicate that the blood didn't merely originate from one person, but from a number of people. As you can see..." the camera pointed towards the ground, "...attempts were made to erase the evidence. However, this is not the most troubling part of the scene. Despite the amount of blood found, no bodies were discovered, living or dead." That's...good. Probably. "In addition, no witnesses to the crime have stepped forward, despite the numerous flats adjoining the roundabout. When police made inquiries earlier in the day, most of the flats were found to be vacant. Because of this, rumors have surfaced that the inhabitants of said flats were the victims in this strange incident. Sources within the police department have reported that another possibility being considered at this time is that this is some sort of prank by medical students..." Xander goes even stiller, not at the words, which are, given the subject matter, somewhat reassuring, but at the immense amount of dust covering the area that the camera's still panning over. Maybe it's nothing, but after so long, he's come to associate dust with vampires. The fact that they'd been vanquished, if they'd been there at all in the first place, was a good thing. The fact that there had been so many as to literally coat the entire area in a fairly thick layer of dust overnight...  
            An army of vampires must've...  
            Xander realizes he's shaking when there's a hesitant hand at his elbow trying to steady him. "Do you—do you think that was your friends?"  
            Somehow, he manages a smile, although the look Fitz gives him says it wasn't very convincing. "My Scooby senses are tingling." That earns him a blank look, so he sighs and tries again. "Buffy's always in the thick of things. Given Dawn's reaction, I don't think anyone that close to me died, but still...I mean, I'd like to say no one died, but with that much blood..." Why can't he stop shaking? He's seen worse. He's seen people killed in front of him, so why does this have him acting like a useless, terrified fifteen-year-old again?  
            "I..." Fitz looks horrified, and that's enough to snap him out of it. Fitz hadn't done anything wrong. Well, no, that's wrong, he had. Even if he thought he was doing the right thing. Xander can't even remember how many times good intentions had burned them throughout the years.  But the point is, what's going on right now, it's bigger than them, and he takes the step and believes Fitz that he'd only knocked them out, not killed them. The guy's not responsible for everything that went wrong since then.  
            "You're not the bad guy. You might've been a crusading idiot, but you're not the bad guy. At least, I think you aren't. Don't prove me wrong, please." It takes a pretty confident expression to get that through Fitz's head, but it finally pierces the thick skull, and the blond manages a shaky smile.  
            "Okay, here's where things stand. There's something big going on, something that's probably already killed a lot of people. I need to stop it, and I don't think I can do it alone. Do you think you're up for being my ally? Because I'm kind of running low on people I can involve in all of this at the moment." He could maybe turn to Wesley again, but the man was good at research, and in any case probably couldn't get away from his job at the demon lawyer firm. He probably wouldn't be any good at a game of Clue without even looking at the board. Xander's hands are somewhat tied as it is, but he can't just sit around and do nothing either.  
            "You'd really give me that chance?" Fitz is somewhat excited, but not ready to take it for granted, and the excitement is definitely muted compared to the somewhat neurotic version earlier. Xander prefers this.  
            One brown eye drifts upward to meet the other's gaze. "If you'd still been acting the way you had been earlier, probably not. As it is...I don't think I can do this alone," he admits.  
            "I'm your man," Fitz declares firmly, holding out a hand to shake, old-fashioned style. Xander ignores the urge to laugh, since he seems to be pretty serious about this, and instead shakes the proffered hand, even if a twinge of pain travels up his arm.


	7. Mind Exercise

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Xander and Fitz share what they know about the situation.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Finally got to the Stand explanation. I agonized over the correct wording as much as I'm sure Fitz did.

            "Great. Um, how to explain..." There's a lot going on, and it's all a bit weird...but then, this guy had summoned some sort of weird thing with tentacles, so he should at least understand a bit better. "Okay, first of all, I'm friends with the Vampire Slayer. She's the one girl in the world born to fight vampires and other things that go bump in the dark, and when one dies another is called to take her place. Except Buffy—that's my friend—figured out how to call all of them at once, so no Slayer ever has to fight alone again. We train them, or at least warn them that their lives might be a little more interesting than most." That probably wasn't completely necessary, but explaining the circumstances was helpful. Maybe. "And then everyone else—we all just kind of hung around and were her sidekicks. The Scooby Gang. We've been fighting things since we were sixteen. Well, some of us were sixteen; that doesn't apply to everybody—" Okay, actually, that's probably enough backstory for now. Not that Fitz doesn't look interested. He does. And astonished. But he's trying to explain what's currently going on. "Anyway, we kind of collect artifacts. We're trying to keep the dangerous ones out of the world, where they can cause trouble. And we ended up with a certain Stone Mask..."  
            Fitz interrupts, and then looks somewhat guilty for doing so. Xander wouldn't have given it a second thought, but waves him on anyway. "Mother told me about that, if it's the same one. It can convert normal people into vampires."  
            When it's the other way around, he has no problem interrupting the same. "That would explain the horrible feeling I had about it, and the weird dreams." He shudders slightly. "Anyway, it got stolen, which is even worse now that I know what it does. And they thought I'd taken it. I thought...I dunno, some random thief, or maybe some practical joke, or something? Maybe I was just hoping, because I knew it wasn't.  Someone inside took it, and framed me for the theft. They wanted me out of the way, so if I showed up again, or got in contact, our thief might react in a way that was of the bad. Of course, if they didn't know, that'd also be a problem, but Dawnie sounded a little more on edge, so I'm guessing they've figured out something's going on..."  
            Fitz is frowning. "All right, then, what exactly do you expect to do from out here?"  
            Xander sighs. That is the problem, really, isn't it. "I'm...I'm not sure. I can't really investigate from here. It'd probably be easiest to figure out the culprit from there, but that's out of the question. Still, I don't plan to just sit around here, either."  
            The Brit sits on the floor patiently. "Well, we could try a little deduction or induction—wait, you probably haven't read..."  
            "I've seen the show. Though I have no idea what 'induction' is." He vaguely remembers it coming up in a class, but he definitely wasn't paying attention at the time.  
            "Inductive reasoning is actually what dear Mr. Holmes used. Observation, experience, and the like, from which you can draw a conclusion, but it isn't a certainty." Okay, that made a lot more sense than when Mrs. Franklin had been talking about it. At least, he thought it'd been her. It was hard to tell. He'd probably been asleep for about half the classes.  
            "I think I'd probably be better at practicing it than knowing all the technical names of these things. I'm a fan, Jim, not a college graduate," Xander admitted, rearranging himself to be more comfortable. They might be here a while. "Yes, I know your name isn't Jim." Of course this guy wouldn't get TV references. Did he even own a TV? He probably did, secretly, like Giles.  
            Fitz blinked, but didn't question. "Well, is there any question that the thief and the one who framed you for the theft are one and the same?"  
            "..." This was something that couldn't be answered right away, no matter how obvious the answer seemed. Without evidence, they probably couldn't rule anything out completely. Or being at the scene, but, again, that was out of the question. "Well, if we're going with the Perry Mason thing, there's probably still a small lingering question, reasonable doubt, but...not much. It's true that if they were the same person, they'd be the best-placed to cover up their own crime."  
            "Right." Fitz seemed delighted with the thoroughness of the logic so far. "That would be the most likely case, correct?"  
            "I...yeah, probably." Of course, other possibilities existed, but they were going with probabilities or something here, right? "My friends would be better at this," he admitted with a sigh. He's no Giles, for instance, and Willow would probably be pretty good at this, too.  
            "Then they would probably at least entertain the conclusion you came to, correct? And these...Slayers. They can take care of themselves?" He can see what Fitz is up to, but he can't quite give up the constant concern for his friends. Even though, for the longest time, he was the most useless one.  
            "I'm more worried about the younger ones," he admits. Of course, he's the last to make any kinds of assumptions. Everyone could die. Some of them have nearly died, while some just have died, but...it wasn't a given that everyone would survive. But out of all of them, the ones with the least training were the most vulnerable, so...yeah, he can admit he's concerned about them. "I personally recruited some of them..."  
            He's brought back to reality by a smack on the head. "And how exactly did you feel when I felt you weren't experienced enough to be able to deal with situations yourself?"  
            Or the humiliating way the Scoobies treated him at times as the un-powered one. Xander laughs, then shakes his head. "Stop having good points!"  
            "Never," Fitz responds, but he's smiling.  
            "So..." Xander hesitated, but it was a question that needed to be asked. "What are these things we were using to fight? Pretender and...okay, that sort of makes sense, but what's juice from a lotus, anyway? Is it nummy?"  
            Fitz chuckled and shook his head. "I honestly have no idea. It just felt...right. Like I imagine Pretender's name came to you. And you ask the hardest questions. It's a simple concept, but...difficult to put into words." He pauses, thinking. "They're...the manifestations of our fighting spirit, I guess."  
            "...Pretender is a part of me?" That feels...right and wrong at the same time.  
            Fitz shrugs. "And unfortunately, they're...somewhat difficult to just train with. Use of your Stand is instinctual, and you only learn new uses through combat. I've had Lotus Juice for longer than you, but..." He shrugs again, and Xander catches a short-lived flame of agony and hate in the green eyes. "Having a Stand is passed down through family lines. I get mine from my mother. And you probably do too, right?"  
            "Definitely not my dad," he agrees. He realizes that, to some extent, it really didn't matter who the thief had been, because they were out of his reach now. His friends were the ones who had to deal with that, at least at the moment. Which means that... "What next?"


	8. Graveyard Shift

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Xander decides that he needs to have a better grasp of his new powers.

            What comes next turns out to be pretty easy. Fitz had stated that one only learned their Stand's powers through fighting, and even though the fights might not be challenging, Xander realized a ready-made answer from experience. He's not sure what's coming next, but some sort of fight is a good guess, since that's really always the answer. So learning more about their Stands and becoming better with them will help them prepare.  
            Which is why he winds up hanging out in a graveyard at a ridiculous time of the morning. He's not at all tired, thanks to Fitz's knocking him out and days spent in a hotel room unconscious. The other is somewhat hesitant, still fearing to be attacked on any street corner or something, but doesn't question or complain. He follows Xander's lead.  
            Sometime soon, he, at least, has to go shopping for new clothes. His clothes aren't in the best of shape, considering everything that's happened lately. Besides the fact that the Hawaiian is a bit...obvious. If they're out looking for him, that's probably one of the things they'll ask about, so a change of wardrobe is probably a good idea anyway.  
            His idle thoughts are interrupted by a sudden awareness. Usually, he'd just continue with the babbling, off track thoughts, never noticing the bad guys until they were grabbing him, but this was a nice improvement. He really hated getting bruised just because he wasn't paying attention.  
            He speaks without turning. If he can throw them off-balance, all the better. "Don't you guys have somewhere to be? Like, hanging out in sewers, or plotting some world-ending plot?" Honestly, he knows the sewer thing is mostly just during the daytime, but hey, coming up with something different to say would have to involve him actually thinking before he speaks.  
            He hears the vampires—there's two of them, which is ridiculously easy, but he's not about to complain when he wanted a nice, easy warm-up. "He smells good, but he talks too much." He's not exactly sure what they mean by 'smelling good'. He'd always been under the impression that vampires had better senses than humans, but then, he's never been a vampire and never intends to be one, so...when he probably hasn't had a bath—he hopes he hasn't had a bath—in a while and had a pretty strenuous fight and everything else, so much that he can smell it...  
            He's not sure what they're talking about, but then, he's not entirely certain what he's babbling about in his own head, either.  
            He grins, opening his eye. "You have no idea how many of my dates say that." Considering that many of them turn out to be demons or other monsters wanting to eat him or other things even more unspeakable, it's not really an exaggeration. Maybe they're sensing the demon magnet thing, if that's even really a thing.  
            He's promised himself he's not going to ask Fitz for help unless it becomes absolutely necessary. He doesn't even plan to use Pretender, which Fitz might panic at and think is reckless, but he really does need to know how to fight, even in situations where he might not be able to call on Pretender. He's not sure what that would even be or mean, but it doesn't hurt to be ready for anything.  
            He's interested in something he's seen a few people use in his dreams. The thing he'd used on Fitz, only he plans for it to be lethal for these undead folks.  
            They charge, coming around from either side in a pincer move. The grin grows, and for the first time he's actually enjoying combat, not being scared out of his wits but throwing himself into the fray. That and the confidence, he thinks vaguely, he's channeling from somebody, but when it feels this good, why should he really care?  
            As he thought, these are fresh from the grave, because they're overeager and moving slower than your average vamp who's lived, or unlived, very long.  
            He feels the deep breathing begin, instinctual, the ebb and flow of battle, and he's rolling forward, letting momentum carry him back into a standing position before they're aware.  
            He's slightly misjudged the position of the one on the right. It's closer than he anticipated, and with a super angry roar that speaks of annoyance turns and punches him.  
            Well, this one's strong, he thinks for a moment as he sails through the air, only to smack into a tombstone with a resounding thud. "Don't like to play with your food?" he taunts, even as his breathing pattern falters. The slightest golden glow that had been building up around his fists flickers and dies. It's easy enough to pick himself up, like he's done it a hundred times before. He has.  
            He hears the rustle, but knows it's Fitz, somehow. Probably freaking out at the way things are going, wanting to step in, but he can't really help it if he's picked up a few things from Buffy. Like the optimum number of insults per fight, and not just getting things over quick and moving on.  
            There's a vampire, running silent, at his left side, trying to take advantage of his blind spot. He senses it, somehow, just like he'd sensed Fitz before, just like he's sensing him now.  
            He remembered the hospital, his friends being awkward and trying to figure out a way to tell him that it was going to be okay, that he wouldn't need both eyes on the battlefield that was their lives. It probably would have been more convincing if Buffy could stand to visit more than the once, and if they weren't trying to convince themselves at the same time.  
            For the first time, he believes Willow telling him it's all going to be okay.  
            He breathes in, deeply but quickly. He's not going to have a lot of time for this.  
            It surprises him just as much as his enemy when his left arm shoots out and somehow extends. At least, that's the only thing that makes sense, because he knows how long his arms are and he knows, somehow, how far away the vamp was, and the two things are definitely different.  
            He's also definitely stronger than he remembers. He's pretty sure he just punched the unbeating heart out of a vampire's back, though of course, since he can't actually see on that side and whatever weird sensing he's doing apparently doesn't work for unmoving things...  
            "Eww! Vamp guts!" he practically shrieks. It's spur of the moment, and his voice, though maybe a bit higher, totally doesn't sound like a girl's.  
            He gets the slightest moment of tingling spidey senses...or...whatever kind of senses he has now, that's beside the point, roll now, analyze later. He hears the sound of the tombstone cracking and cranks his head around to stare.  
            He's miscalculated. This isn't a fledge. This is the real deal.  
            "Crap." Honestly, he would've preferred something else to put the enraged vamp off balance, but he supposes that he can't really be blamed. The thought pops into his head, and it's a plan that he can get behind, since it's actually something he's had a lot of practice in.  
            He gets up without another hesitation or backwards glance and begins running. The only downside to this plan would be if Fitz feels that this is a serious enough situation that he needs to step in. Honestly, given his new powers, Xander isn't seriously worried. He's had to deal with non-fledges before, after all, and he didn't have anything fancy to help him then. But that doesn't mean that Fitz knows that.  
            The vamp, which is apparently carrying a really, really huge tombstone that it had snapped up out of the ground, worms, dirt and all, is at his heels. He can't help the giggle of excitement. Yeah, okay, so maybe it's dangerous, but it's also fun, too.  
            "Hey. Ugly!" Oh, great, way to ruin the plan, Fitz.  
            Still, he ended up killing a fledge, and this is probably his sire. It's not as if he'll just go after just another dumb human when there's someone more personal to drain...Oh, and there he goes, never mind.  
            Weapons, weapons. He probably can't use the glowy hands thing. From everything he can remember from the dreams, it's not a ranged thing. And something tells him Pretender won't get there in time.  
            There's a nice, wooden cross instead of a gravestone for this one. Perfect. "Sorry." He doesn't have time for anything else, even if he feels a little guilty for defiling someone's grave like this. Still, things to keep the living alive, and all.  
            He only has seconds before the sire's on Fitz, and he doesn't think, even with Lotus Juice, that the guy's ready to take on a Sire. Breathe in, breathe out, snap the cross and in one smooth motion throw it.  
            The improvised stake buries itself in the vampire's back, and Fitz accidentally breathes in and gets a faceful of vampire dust. Xander knows it tastes awful, even worse than mummy-kiss, and has this nasty habit of making you cough like it's trying to suffocate you as a last act of spite.  
            It's safe, his senses tell him; no more creatures of the night in this particular cemetery.  
            He starts laughing so hard he falls on the ground. "You...are a lunatic," Fitz manages between coughing fits. It only makes him laugh harder.


	9. Battlefield Rations

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Xander tells Fitz a little of what he's experienced.

            "You hungry? I'm hungry." In his head, he's babbling, but for once he manages to actually shut up out loud. Maybe it's being slightly tired from the fight.  
            The looks Fitz keeps giving him are definitely conflicted. It looks like he wants to keep scolding, but on the other hand whatever mystical respect he has for this family won't let him actually say any of it. He sighs. "Look, I'm not a telepath. Say whatever you feel like saying."  
            Oh, great, now the conflict looks painful. Maybe he really should be babbling out loud. "Okay. If I'm running, that's a strategic decision. I can be an idiot sometimes, so running because I'm terrified of something that it makes sense to be terrified of isn't really something that I do. He was just a Sire, and a fairly newly risen one at that. Which means that there's probably a nest, but...we can deal with figuring that part out later because a nest is of the bad and I can probably deal with that many vampires at once eventually when I actually figure out how to actually use my superpowers and get a costume and everything."  
            He has to take a breath; he's not Willow, after all. "I've faced worse. The guy that took my eye, for example."  
            He can't help the indrawn breath at that. Thinking about Caleb is still a bit scary. "I've had a lot of unintended fighting practice. And yeah, so my usual plan is to run to Buffy and the others, so at least I have help, but I don't need them for everything. I've saved the world on my own." He blinks at that. He'd never really gotten to sit down and process that.  
            "It's usually stuff like CPR to ensure the defender of the world doesn't die, and staring down a zombie so he doesn't blow up and open the Hellmouth, and talking people who are going to destroy the world out of it, but I wasn't just going to let the world end. Or my friends get hurt." He can feel a fierce strength rise in him, and welcomes it, because it's not a new feeling.  
            Meanwhile Fitz looks like Xander's slammed him in the face with a two-by-four. The American smiles apologetically.  
            "Your eye," the Englishman eventually says softly.  
            "I suppose I could've lost it working construction," Xander muses quietly, then grins goofily. Seems he's as full of surprises for his new ally as his new ally is for him. "Yeah, I worked construction."  
            "It wasn't just clumsiness." Fitz looks a bit sheepish at this revelation.  
            "Nah, it wasn't just clumsiness." They're pretty much walking aimlessly. Xander's not really that familiar with wherever-they-are. He should probably ask where he's been kidnapped, or adultnapped, to, at some point. "It was pretty gruesome, actually. When I was a kid," he continues, wistful, "...I thought eyepatches and pirates were cool. I thought it'd be an awesome story to tell people, y'know, 'Yeah, I lost an eye, and I didn't even flinch.' Nobody ever realizes how painful it is. They told me I was just lucky I'd been brought in to the hospital so fast." He's had far too many near-death experiences lately.  
            "I-if you don't want to talk about it..." That's sympathy on the Brit's face. Maybe hard to spot, but he'd had practice with Giles. Which in return made him certain that he actually wanted to talk about this. If he didn't, the topic would haunt them.  
            "An evil priest stabbed out my eye with his thumb." He was proud that his voice only wavered a little. "If you want, I can tell you more, but I really am kind of hungry. Now I know why Slayers, even grown up ones, still eat like they're teenagers."  
            Fitz makes a face. He's carefully not reacting, but at the same time it's not all pity or horror, either, which earns him a couple gold stars in Xander's book of people. "I actually don't think I know of many places open too late—certainly not this late." He anticipates the devastated face Xander's about to make and laughs. "I'll try to find us something before you starve to death."  
            Xander mock-pouts. Maybe he'd been spoiled by the Slayer Mansion with its open kitchens at any odd hour. Of course, he wasn't really going to starve to death. He'd gotten a lot more used than he'd ever thought possible to lack of food when he was tracking down Slayers in Africa, but that didn't mean that he'd liked the feeling, either.  
            Fitz makes some calls, as Xander keeps an eye out and half listens in. Few of the fledges and younger vamps would be out and about so close to the sun rising and dusting them, but the exceptions weren't worth getting ambushed by. The vamps now would be older, bolder, or meaner, or some unhealthy combination of the three. Spike, the Big Bad out to kill the Scooby gang version, was one that would run around even in daylight, and tangling with him or his like would definitely be of the bad at the moment. They're not ready to take on someone quite that strong yet.  
            He doesn't sense anything. It might be too quiet. That might, unfortunately, mean that they'd come to the attention of the local nest, which was now plotting their demise. Like humans, vamps are much scarier when they come in packs. And actually plan things out.  
            For a bookstore owner, Fitz reminds him a lot of a certain Watcher. Fitz seems to have a nearly endless contact list, and very few of them actually yell about contacting them at a more decent hour. On the other hand, the fact that the Englishman couldn't think of any off the top of his head and it's taking so long aren't reassuring. Neither is the face that he makes as he walks back. "I apologize, but the only ones I could find were in London. However, there isn't that much time before the breakfast places will be open, and I do have a few things in the refrigerator in our room, as I didn't want to leave you too often when you were unconscious."  
            "How...thoughtful of you," Xander manages, pulling a face. His ally immediately looks like a miserable mistreated kitten, and he quickly shakes his head. "It's fine. Right now, I think any food would prevent me from collapsing."  
            "We could...potentially stop by a corner shop..." Fitz manages, the thought seeming alien at best. Xander's brain refuses to translate that at the moment, even though he's pretty sure he actually knows what that means in American English.  
            "Nah. It'll probably take longer, right?" Xander shrugs.  
            The Englishman looks somewhat amused and annoyed, but doesn't actually question. "I'm the one who knows where the hotel is!" he calls after Xander, but only gets a laugh in return.  
            The answer drifts back to him. "Then you better hurry up!"

            Mouth full (which earns an eyeroll from Fitz), he goes through what he knows of the kind of vampire Buffy fights. Siring, all the 'vamp' family dynamics, all the ways to kill them, what little they know about the First, some of the other things they've had to deal with. He keeps talking, going into some of their random adventures now, and given the look he's getting, Fitz isn't certain what to believe of his stories. The one about the preying mantis substitute teacher, for example, or the Hell Goddess (which he doesn't really care to talk about, really, as it's still kind of terrifying), or the fact that Buffy's died a few more times than average, or... It's somewhat reassuring that even the really embarrassing things are fairly easy to talk about. Xander really has grown up. He's probably making his favorite witch proud. Well, maybe not at the moment, given that he went AWOL and that whole trial thing, but...in general. Just as she's making him proud. He's gotten off track again, but it leads to a more interesting story in general. Other than explaining a few of the things they'd faced and survived to the Potentials, he hadn't really done a lot of storytelling before, but decided he definitely liked it.  
            Eventually, Fitz stirs, and Xander raises a questioning eyebrow.  
            "I apologize; I didn't mean to interrupt..." he begins, but Xander waves that off, grinning a little and fighting off a yawn. The fact that he hasn't slept yet suddenly occurred to him, and with that realization slight exhaustion began to descend. "If we begin walking now, we'll probably arrive at approximately the time they begin serving breakfast."  
            Xander's stomach rumbles. "Lead the way."


	10. Butterflies and Hurricanes

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Fitz reveals a little more about what he knows and how he knows it.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Reminder: this is an AU.

            Given that Fitz's food-related calls hadn't incited ire, Xander wasn't really surprised when the restauranteer opened the doors slightly early and gave them a nice table toward the back. He'd also expected the slightly disdainful glance-over, but then, he hadn't gotten new clothes yet. He'd bring it up, but not just yet. A new look could wait until after he'd eaten, and he had the feeling Fitz had a story of his own to share. The Englishman was slightly stiffer than normal and kept glancing at him. The worrying of his lips was a bit of a clue, too.  
            Maybe he was being a bit cruel, but Xander wasn't about to ask about it. His new ally would say something or not on his own without prompting. And even with an odd variety of snacks in relatively small portions in the fridge, his hunger was beginning to make him distracted enough that a conversation too soon wouldn't be too useful, anyway. They'd just end up having to go over the topic again when he could actually concentrate.  
            Half in a daze, he finally realized that he'd eaten mushrooms and tomatoes halfway through his eggs. Oddly enough, though, he didn't have the same gag reflex as usual.  
            Then again, he's starving, so he'll eat just about anything. It's nice that his subconscious managed to save the bacon for a time when he'd actually appreciate it. He picks it up and bites into it, savoring the difference between British and American cooking.  
            "I...do you feel like hearing a story?" Fitz eventually asks, fidgeting.  
            "Well, you listened to me telling stories all night," Xander shrugs, still talking with his mouth full. He senses five presences again. One's the restaurant owner in perfectly pressed suit, still occasionally looking at him with a disapproving look, and one in the back is probably the cook that made these nummy eggs and bacon. Two are him and Fitz, probably. Assuming he actually what he's doing with this thing. And the last...his gaze slides past Fitz, and there's a girl out there. She's in ratty jeans and shoes that are falling apart and a really old t-shirt that he can't even make out the design on the front. It takes her a second to realize he's staring. She's not a vampire, since she's standing in sunlight, so he grins cautiously at her. She frowns and sticks out her tongue, hurrying on. He's getting better at this, which is a relief. Life-radar or whatever could definitely prove useful against sudden ambush.  
            "....Do I have your attention?" Oh, and good, he's earned the slightly arrogant tone again.  
            "Yeah, yeah." He waves for his ally to go on with the fork.  
            "I told you that our families have been associated for quite some time now." Okay, yeah, he's really worried about something. Fitz opens his mouth and closes it again, uncertain about what to say next. Finally, he continues in a softer voice. "I've been calling you Mr. Joestar, but I'm not certain that's what you want to be called."  
            "Call me whatever's easiest for you," Xander shrugs, and that makes the man look even more distressed.  
            "Yes, but I...if you don't want to be a Joestar..." He's unable to quite say what's bothering him, but the American thinks he's following anyway.  
            "It's better than being a Harris. Trust me." There's absolutely no hesitation about that.  
            "I remember. Alcoholics, was it?" The tone is soft, understanding. The question receives a nod in return, and this, of all things, seems to give his ally courage. "Yes, right. In that case...may I call you Jojo?" A blink is his answer this time, and he hastens to explain, "It's the family nickname."  
            It's familiar, comforting, like coming home at long last. Even if he only knows it from dreams. There's a sense of belonging that he never felt back at the house in Sunnydale, the house that he still has to escape sometimes in nightmares. "I seem to remember some really awesome people who shared that name." Of course, he doesn't know more than a fight here and there that his dreams decided should be shared, but...his thoughts are derailed as green eyes stare at him. "Didn't I mention that I've had dreams about them?" Isn't that a Joestar thing? Or is he just taking what he knows from Buffy as a Chosen One and overapplying it?  
            "Somehow, it didn't come up," Fitz manages dryly, and Xander can't help but chuckle.  
            "You know more about my family than I do. This is new?" He's been neglecting his eggs. They probably feel all neglected now. He should fix that. At least he's not eating and talking, at the moment anyway.  
            His ally has begun to calm down, with the sort of suppressed British excitement that Xander had always associated with Watchers, particularly Giles. "As far as I'm aware, no previous Joestar has had this ability, but it's probably related to whatever your Stand can do."  
            Given that he probably unlocked his powers with the weird door thing in the one dream, that's probably not a bad assumption. Xander thinks about that for a little while before swallowing his food. "Well, in any case, the answer is yes. Call me whatever you want to, though if it's too hurtful, I might sit and watch B5 and pout." Given that he didn't have access to his collection, that probably wasn't even a possibility, but hey.  
            "It's a mark of respect," Fitz quickly moves to correct, before realizing he was probably being teased again. "Anyway...you've probably noticed that this is more than just a family alliance, for me."  
            Xander did wonder why anyone would go to such lengths for someone whose ancestors had worked together, but for once didn't actually voice that. He'll have to treat himself to ice cream or something for actually getting his mouth to not say anything without consulting with his brain first.  
            "It will probably help if I give you my full name. I'm not sure how much you know of through dreams, though since you said that I know more than you, I would assume that they weren't the most thorough." Maybe he also got formal when he was nervous. Like Willow tended to babble even more than normal, and Xander had picked that up from her. "You're not free to call me anything other than Fitz. I suppose you could call me by my last name, but...it reminds me of my full name and I suspect that it was a pun in bad taste."  
            It'd probably take a lot of self-control if it's as bad as Fitz is making it out to be, but the American had been getting better at that recently.  
            "My full name," he states as he leans forward, "...is Carter Fitz Speedwagon." So...Fitz is a middle name? And wait, back up a second...vague memories of the British Lord, the very first guy, and a man with a scar and...the same blond hair and love of hats. He can see it. Fitz's hair isn't as long, though.  
            "I probably don't know enough about word origins to get the pun." He's surprised he says it that easily. It's probably something with the word 'cart', but he doesn't know for sure, so it technically might not be a white lie...Fitz looks relieved, though, which was the point.  
            "American education..." Apparently Speedwagon can't resist the grumble again, though, which has them both hiding a smile. "It's more personal because our mothers were fast friends."  
            Xander tries to imagine his mother doing anything but sitting at the front table with a bottle in her hand. It's hard, but then, if she'd come from such an amazing family, then there's probably a story to how she'd ended up in such a situation.  
            "Mother would always tell me stories about the Joestars, especially her best friend. Josephine was apparently a terror." The fond look on Fitz's face seemed a bit...distant, like this was a window to the past only meant for his gaze. Despite the formal words, the Speedwagons seemed close. "I thus had the expectation from when I was quite young that one day Ms. Joestar would skip into our lives as if she'd never left—I had the feeling that she and my mother were practically inseparable—and I would form just as close a friendship with another Joestar. Unfortunately," the Brit sighed deeply, "...things didn't quite work out the way I'd imagined them in my head."


	11. Kiss From a Rose

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Fitz elaborates on how his family knows Xander's.

            Xander couldn't help but be drawn in by the story. What Fitz was talking about was almost impossible to imagine, which is possibly why he finds it so breathtaking. Forget the Hulk; here's a transformation he'd love to see. Home was never home; family was about the farthest thing from family you could find. But this mother...he'd love to meet her. Would she join him in eating junk food and having B5 and Star Trek marathons? Would she embarrass him in front of all of his friends? It's...probably odd he's actually kind of looking forward to that, but then, a mother interested in his life beat the old one any day. He leaned forward, food forgotten.  
            "My mother never talked very much about her own Stand, or your mother's. I think they reminded her of a brighter time, just out of reach." Fitz hesitated, then continued. "But given some of her stories, I think that together, they were nigh unbeatable. And for a time, I think they believed that they were, walking out into the darkness with a laugh on their lips and a smile in their hearts. They had no fear."  
            It's somewhat of a shock when Speedwagon notices before Xander that the restaurant's owner has returned to inquire frostily about whether the eggs were satisfactory. He's irritated. The story's interesting, and probably not something that they should just be talking about out in the open. "They're great!" He smiles sunnily, then stuffs his mouth full of lukewarm egg. It's definitely not as good this cold, but the ravenous hunger by this point has eased, to be replaced by curiosity, an emotion of which it's never been argued he has little, and a delight at actually getting answers for once, rather than having them dangle just out of his reach.  
            In disgust, the restaurateur huffs and quickly disappears, and Xander has to hide his smile. Mission accomplished. He grabs another piece of bacon. "Go on," he tells his ally, gesturing with the meat.  
            Fitz rolls his eyes fondly and continues. "Your mother always had powers, but not mine. My mother and future father were traveling with yours when an incident occurred. I...hmm. I was just going to throw out words without knowing whether you understood them. Do you know what a Stand Arrow is, Jojo?"  
            Xander hastily swallows the food he'd been absently chewing. No one warned him that audience participation was going to be a part of this. "Umm...an Arrow that's a Stand?"  
            His ally sighs. "No, although that isn't a bad guess." He pauses, then continues. "It's the source of Stands." Xander opens his mouth again, setting the forkful of egg back down. "Once someone receives their Stand by the Stand Arrow, the power can also be transmitted through family bloodline." He shuts his mouth again. "May I continue?"  
            Xander looks sheepish and nods, picking the fork back up and continuing with his now mostly cold meal.  
            "No one, not even the Speedwagon Foundation, knows much about the Stand Arrows. I'll get to that later." He shoots another look that tells Xander that it's a very good thing that Fitz isn't a teacher. That sort of about-turn never boded well with teachers. "Where was I...? Right. I won't go into the whole story here, but during one of Josephine Joestar's trips, in which she was always accompanied by my mother, they encountered a Stand Arrow. The Speedwagon Foundation hadn't anticipated the presence of a Stand Arrow, and so both my mother and my father, who hadn't married her yet, were affected. My mother threw herself in front of yours." A story like this should probably be weird, but for a survivor of Sunnydale this was pretty much everyday life.  
            "The effects of a Stand Arrow can be...horrific." Fitz's hands unconsciously clenched into the napkin at his place. "If the person afflicted is not spiritually strong enough, it can kill them. Fast or slow. If they're not strong enough to manifest a Stand, they die. If they manifest a Stand, but are not strong enough to control it, they die." Speedwagon suddenly relaxed, letting the napkin go with a self-conscious expression on his face. "Fortunately, neither my mother nor my father were weak enough to die, or I would not be here." Despite the words, his face remained troubled. "What was the word I used earlier? Inseparable? For the longest time, it was true, even before my mother received her Stand. They grew even closer after the incident, and even less afraid of the future."  
            Xander finds a thought breaking the spell Fitz's story had woven. "You know, when people keep adding 'or so they thought' to stories, that implies what comes next is very much of the bad." At the green-eyed stare, he reviews the last few seconds until he realizes something. "I...said that out loud, didn't I?"  
            "Good job, you can recognize foreshadowing." The somewhat arrogant smirk on Fitz's face and egotistical words are contradicted by the pleased glitter in his eyes.  
            "Do I get a gold star?" Xander asks innocently. Even as he smiles, he realizes the technique he's using, so much habit that he hardly made the choice. His words are more...instinct, cutting the tension because that's crucial for fighters and Buffy and the others never even realized how much it probably helped. Not that he really knows either, but still.  
            "Jojo!" Fitz looks shocked. "You already have food, cooked for you by a very good chef. Eat it!"  
            "Yes, sir." He mock salutes, but the way he digs in isn't mocking at all. It's an order he's happy to follow, and the hunger is beginning to return. Just slightly.  
            Fitz shakes his head, fighting the smile. "My mother never spoke too much about it. I think she believed she was protecting me, though I'm not sure how. I've thought about it, over and over, but I can't understand..." He's forced to look to the side until he gets his breathing under control and can resume. "They ran into an enemy that they couldn't face together. The only choice was escape. For some reason, they couldn't get help from the Speedwagon Foundation, or perhaps they merely couldn't get help in time. And so the unbeatable team split up, to try to make sure that someone survived..." Fitz bites back a sob, which is terrifying. He's British. He shouldn't cry.  
            Xander has a feeling he knows how this story ends, but he doesn't want to admit it, even to himself. He eventually reaches out a hesitant hand, lays it on top of his ally's shaking arm, hoping that the man can get some comfort from it.  
            "For years, my mother and I were safe. I was twelve when the monster returned. I didn't see the fight. I never saw her use her Stand, Kiss From a Rose. I..." Fitz's eyes are filled with tears now, though he now soldiers on through the pain. "I hear that it was beautiful. Elegant. I wish I'd seen it, even once, even if we weren't fighting. My mother was strong but gentle. I didn't want to imagine her fighting, but knowing that one of the Joestars was with her and that she had survived to be telling me these stories was enough to calm my fears. We stayed with my aunt, however little my mother and I cared for her and her greed. It must have been a good hiding place, because it took her killer a little over twelve years to find us..." Speedwagon angrily wipes away the tears. "I walked into the drawing room to find my mother dying. I...don't remember much of the following days, nor the years after that. For a long time, I was angry at the world, lashed out at everything, but that wasn't how my mother would have wished me to honor her memory. And in any case, it wasn't the world that had taken my only family from me. Josephine Joestar hadn't abandoned my mother. She'd believed, I'm sure, that their enemy would follow, for a Joestar was a greater prize than a Speedwagon. I even believed the other Joestars might have been wiped out, given that I never heard from them."  
            Xander bit his lip.  
            "No, Jojo, it's not your fault." The sigh was that of a giant, holding the world with all its faults and imperfections and beauty, on his back. "My father was the coward. My mother was pregnant, though she hadn't told your mother yet. She wanted it to be a surprise, I'm sure. And despite how much my mother looked up to him, he wasn't a hero in her stories. He ran to save himself, left my mother on her own. I hope he got killed." The hate and bitterness was like looking in a mirror, and felt like a shock of cold water to the face. Still, a man who would abandon a woman, even one who could fight, in such a condition...no, he couldn't be forgiven, but perhaps death was too lenient. No, that path of thinking only leads to becoming the evil one, and possibly world destruction. "Someday, I will run into my mother's killer. I'm sure he must have been a Stand user, one powerful enough to overcome Josephine Joestar and Mercia Speedwagon together, so I have a lot of training to go. But I will ensure I'm ready, and once we meet, I will have no mercy."


	12. Violent Whispers

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Xander and Fitz return to their hotel room only to find a surprise waiting for them.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Unfortunately, I'm going back to college soon, so my update schedule will probably get sporadic at best, at worst not publishing at all for a while.

            Xander lets out a long breath of air, unsure of what to say in return. What he was about to say might shatter a few of Fitz's long-held beliefs, but he couldn't just stay silent, either. It'd feel like hiding things, and so, yeah, okay, they probably weren't likely to talk about absolutely everything, still working on crossing the gap between ally and friend, but he'd feel bad hiding this. "If you told me my mother was capable of more than trying to keep up with my dad in drinking and yelling, I wouldn't have believed you. Earlier." He breathes in again, trying to find the precise wording for this. "I...like I've told you, I've seen a lot of strange things, and if anything could take someone that strong and break their will and memory, either the Hellmouth or something Stand-slash-Joestar-y could probably do it, right?" Xanman, you need to stop breaking people's hopes and dreams.  
            Fitz was looking particularly let down by this revelation, but his sense of practicality is stronger than his hero worship. "That would explain why she didn't come and save my mother, because if anyone would, if anyone could, Josephine would've been there."  
            Xander feels the urge to flinch, to look away, but in the end, he does neither. "I wish I could've met her." At the somewhat blank look, he explains, feeling a little sheepish, "...both of them."  
            The smile he gets in return is clouded over by tears, but completely genuine. For once, he's managed to say the right thing. "Thank you. I'm thankful to have met you as well. However much the circumstances might have been...better."  
            Xander can't help but chuckle at that. Masters of understatement. "Yeah, well, it could've been worse..." Fitz could've been a demon trying to kill him, for instance, or have actually killed the Scoobies, or been an evil warlock guy. As introductions go, this was downright tame.  
            The owner appears again to take his plate, which he's finally mostly worked through. Xander begins to take his wallet out and is about to ask what the meal cost, but is met by an icy glare and a "It's on the house" before the plate is whisked away.  
            The American winces, before making a connection to the current conversation. "It could've gone like that."  
            "I did him a favor a while ago," Fitz remarks, again trying not to smile at his fighting companion. "He wasn't pleased that I wasn't asking for a favor for myself, persay, and your table manners appalled him. He also doesn't like anyone thinking he needs charity, which, I'm sure, is how he took your offer to pay."  
            He's met with a sigh. "Hey, my table manners are fine. He should just be glad I wasn't eating Ethiopian food. I bet he'd be really freaked out by that." The wide-eyed stare calls for further elaboration. "It's all just basically finger food using a kind of flatbread." And that didn't help at all. Okay. "I was finding Slayers in Africa until a few months ago. Partly why I'm so tanned." He grins at that, pleased. Getting that dark was a lot less work than sunbathing or just generally hanging outside, and surprisingly enough the ladies seemed to like it. Weird when they wouldn't touch him before, but maybe he really was finally maturing or whatever. They just had to wait until Anya died, though, didn't they? The grin fades, and Fitz looks concerned. "Eh, I'm okay." He stands. "Let's get out of here before I get yelled at again."  
            "Yelling is lower class. Glares are an art form," the Englishman states, joining him. "The hotel, probably?"  
            "I feel like I could sleep for a week." Xander stretches and is somewhat surprised to note that unless he's imagining things, he might be able to reach just a little higher than before.

            "...so I'm pretty sure I can use ripple-fu to make up for the fact that I can't see with my left eye," Xander finishes proudly as they exit the elevator, grinning.  
            Fitz raises an eyebrow. "'Ripple-fu'?"  
            He shrugs. "It's a martial arts style, basically, and it's called the ripple." They probably disagree on how definitive this answer is, but Xander isn't about to bring out his extensive knowledge of...okay, admittedly probably silly martial arts movies, but getting it to be that goofy is the work of a genius. He doesn't honestly feel like this needs any more explanation than he's already given, and it's taking all of his newfound strength to keep himself walking normally and his eyes from closing. He really is exhausted.  
            Which is why it takes him until they reach the door for his newfound senses to warn him that they're not alone.  
            Instantly he recoils, putting a warning finger of silence on his lips as Fitz begins to react. It doesn't take long for his ally to realize what that means. So when he was saying that he hadn't had much practice with Lotus Juice, that didn't mean that he'd had none, either. He moves almost silently to the other side of the door, which is pretty impressive considering he's wearing those classy dress shoes that make clacking noises all over the place.  
            Okay, so Xander's tired and dealing with this fight so soon after the first one probably isn't the best idea. He seems awake, hyper even, but it's like a sugar crash waiting to happen. It's artificial. Not that artificial isn't tasty and he's getting sidetracked again.  
            He leans down as low as he can go, trying to be soundless, trying to see whether he can see beneath the door and figure out where the mysterious presence he can sense is hiding. His ability to sense Fitz, now comforting and familiar, and himself, and whoever's inside the room keeps winking in and out like he's blinking really fast or something. He only slowly realizes that given the dream-rules, it's probably because his breathing is anything but steady. He can't concentrate on it well. This is why they really need to train, but there's no time.  
            Which is why he can only throw himself backward seconds before something springs out at him from under the door. Seriously, there's just something weird about Stands and tentacles.


	13. Hide and Seek

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> The fight with the unexpected intruder continues.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Well, that was faster than expected.  
> Still, still school, don't expect too fast of updates. I'll still be checking email, though, so feel free to comment/respond.  
> ~Dreamer~

            He throws himself backwards and only manages to fall on the floor. The Stand flies over his head and into the wall. He has a second to cushion his head with his hands, which he does, but the sharp pain tells him that they've begun bleeding again even through the bandage.  
            Xander realizes that it's not several tentacles, just one, and it's trying feverishly to escape. He doesn’t bother to think for a second that maybe if it’s not attacking him, he shouldn’t provoke the fight in his condition. Maybe he’s getting a little overconfident with the rush of new power and everything. He's still dazed, but he thinks he can manage...  
            "Toooraaaaaaa!" Pretender answers the call, arm springing out to grab at the tentacle.  
            Unlike Lotus Juice, it doesn't cut like razors. It still hurts, but it's more of a phantom pain. Oddly enough, Pretender seems to have fully healed, so it's like it's an echo of his own wounds. Like a bruise, really. Or...something. He can feel the dull ache and the sharp pain at the same time, and it's weird.  
            He needs to focus, or this fight may very well kill him.  
            It wriggles desperately, thrashing around and hissing like a teapot having a tantrum. It's taking all of Pretender's strength to hold on, even when he adds the second arm. Of course, the Stand’s weaker, too, because he’s weaker, and that’s really not…  
            Focus. Breathe. The owner of the Stand—he'd sensed the person, right? Or hadn't he? With the ripple-fu sense blinking, a strobe light gone haywire, it'd been hard to get much more than a quick 'we're not alone' warning before his breathing had messed it up.  
            Which to go after, the Stand or the User? The User would probably be more vulnerable, but…could he even get to the person before the Stand was able to launch an attack that they had yet to understand? Could he even find the person? His breath was definitely ragged.  
            The flailing Stand manages to smack right into him, and instantly his vision greys out. It doesn’t hurt, not exactly, so why is his soul crying out? He’s in an empty, meaningless void, floating, and no matter how much he flails there’s no sound, no one coming to save him. It’s eating him, becoming him, and there’s nothing he can do. Suddenly there’s an overlay of the real world on top of this, but no matter how much he screams at himself to move, to talk, he’s completely incapable of reaching out and touching that real world just beyond him. He loses all pretense of concentration, losing track of even Pretender. Why is it suddenly so cold? He curls up on himself, but it’s no use. The warmth’s gone. He’s useless, worthless. He can’t move. Just the Donut Guy. Fitz is probably laughing at him right now, the fool who thought he was a hero, if he wasn’t dying right now, which would definitely be worse. He couldn’t save anyone. Not Anya, not Buffy. This is worse than being invisible. He’s inconsequential. No one bothers to pay attention to him because he’s not worth the effort.  
            It takes a while, but he becomes aware of the sensation of floating, of a slight warmth bringing a touch of life back, of a number of limbs wrapped around him in some weird hug. For long eternities, he doesn’t care whether it’s friend or foe, whether he’s about to die any second. As long as he doesn’t have to open his eyes, he doesn’t care. He may be a nobody, but at least he doesn’t have to think about that fact. He’s always thinking, too much, probably. He welcomes the comforting oblivion.  
            The thought occurs to him that Fitz might be dead because of him. Because he was weak and a show-off. He doesn’t want to confront that reality, but he owes it to his new ally to open his eyes and at least arrange for a funeral.  
            “—star. Mr. Joestar!” He blinks hazily, and belatedly makes the connection that this is Fitz’s voice.  
            “Fitz?” His voice is weak and barely recognizable, but somehow Speedwagon hears him anyway. He starts slightly on hearing his own voice out loud and not inside his head, and then he realizes something else, that he can move, even a little bit.  
            “Thank goodness.” That’s genuine relief in his voice. The slightest relief moves through Xander’s heart before he realizes that as long as he hangs around, the Englishman will never know peace and will keep being put into danger like this. Maybe it’s better if he just…lets go. Like the issue with the love spell, and…nah, it’s better if the Xanman just stops thinking altogether. It’s safer here, without thought, without him doing something else dumb. Unfortunately, Speedwagon doesn’t seem to be on board with that plan. “No, Jojo, I’m not going to let you sleep. We’re going to go after that Stand user, and we are going to win.” Suddenly the warmth and hug are gone, and he’s deposited, shivering, on the ground again. Hands that are somewhat warm help him up, but he misses how easy the other was.  
            He can’t keep his balance, and his eyes keep trying to close. He stumbles a little, and instantly Fitz is there, supporting him. And that’s when he feels something wet and sticky on his ally’s shirt. Lazily he reaches up and touches it, pulling the hand away to survey, somewhat uncomprehendingly, the reddish stuff that’s gotten on his fingertips. It takes effort to process what that means; even more effort to speak his concerns. “Is that blood?”  
            The Englishman smiles grimly. If he was Giles, Xander would’ve said that he was in Ripper Battle Mode. “It is, but don’t worry. Somehow, when that Stand brushed past me, I ended up with cuts on my chest. It’s not serious at the moment. They’re not deep, but if they keep bleeding, they will be. Lotus Juice was unable to find any wounds on you, but the Stand clearly affected you as well. If we don’t make the User undo whatever the Stand did, we may be in serious trouble.”


	14. Never Be All Right

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Xander and Fitz look for the Stand User.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> What a...Christmasy chapter to be posting. /em laughs  
> Be that as it may, Happy Christmas, or whatever holiday you celebrate!

            It takes effort, but eventually Xander manages to reply. “How are you planning to do that?” Every word’s a struggle. He doesn’t particularly feel like finishing his question. Fitz can get it. He’s much smarter than the Zeppo. “London’s huge.” His eyes try to close, but Fitz shakes him again. He’d resent how bossy Speedwagon is right now, but he can’t bring himself to care. He doesn’t have much energy, and if he did, it wouldn’t be spent on that.  
            “Neither of us is dying today,” the blond promises him. “And on that note, we will find the Stand’s owner, because we’re not going to die.”  
            Xander manages a smile. That’s about the answer he expected. He doesn’t bother to answer this time, though.  
            “Could you sense anything with your Ripple-fu?” Fitz hesitates a second before using what he no doubt considers a ridiculous name, but uses it anyway. Probably because Xander had been the one to name it, with his particular Xander-like naming style.  
            “I was just showing off. I’m useless.” It’s even harder to speak out loud. He’d almost go for telepathy, except he didn’t particularly want to think either.  
            “You’re not…” Fitz sighs deeply, rubbing his temples. “…All right, then. Will food help?”  
            Xander thinks about that. Twinkies. Chocolate. The cake he’d shared with Dawnie in the kitchen so long ago. Pancakes.  
            Nothing sounds good. That should ring alarm bells in his head. In fact, he’s pretty sure he hears them ringing. But ignoring them is the easier route to take.  
            His lack of a reaction, apparently, is enough to worry Fitz further. But it’s acceptable as part of the conversation, which is good, because this is way too difficult.  
            He’s placed leaning near the front desk, carefully. “I’m just going to go look for clues.”  
            He thinks about replying. About calling him Sherlock, or asking if he needs a magnifying glass. He doesn’t.  
            He’s happily dozing when a voice he doesn’t recognize asks a question that requires deciphering. “Did she run out on you?” The man looks a bit taken aback at the blank stare he receives, and clarifies, “…You know, the woman who tore out of here a couple minutes ago.”  
            Fitz has come back, and can join in. “What woman?”  
            “She was shabbily dressed, which is why I was shocked. Usually we wouldn’t let in her type, but then, somehow she got in without us seeing.” That description rings more bells that are quickly added to the ‘Xander is ignoring’ list. “And I think I saw a snake, which is…” The man shudders.  
            “She’s a burglar. She took something valuable.” The man looks shocked, and the conversation continues. It’s too much work to follow it though. Xander resumes staring at the wall, not letting himself think about Anya, or Buffy, the second time, or Jesse, or about how he couldn’t fight the First, couldn’t even stop himself from losing an eye.  
            “Come on, Jojo.” He doesn’t move. A flame suddenly appears in his vision, and he falls a little, startled. “Focus on the flame, Xander. Please.”  
            It’s pretty. Xander’s gaze drops helplessly to his hands. His hands which have nothing but blood and pain on them. Hands that have hurt, hands that have failed to help. A little blood’s seeped through the bandages, but it’s nothing he doesn’t deserve.  
            “Concentrate on walking. You can do that, can’t you? It’s something simple, something manageable, something even you can do.” There’s not a hint of mocking, which for a fleeting moment Xander misses. It’d be normal.  
            He glances back up, at the matches, at the gentle face in front of him, and nods. It’s a small nod, but he needs to save his strength if he’s going to walk.  
            Somehow, following Fitz one step at a time, they make it to a bus. It’s a double decker, which would’ve had him really excited under normal circumstances. He’d be babbling idiocies about mummies and Stonehenge and all sorts of things, and someone would listen with an amused indulgence. He stares fixedly at somewhere instead. It’s easy enough to do. He does move his gaze when the Englishman nudges him and whispers, “…You’re really scaring her, you know.” His vision sharpens again in protest, and he notices a raggedy girl sitting about where he’d been staring mindlessly. He gives her what little smile his energy allows and looks away, staring at something else he doesn’t comprehend.  
            They get off the bus. They walk around aimlessly for a little, before Xander can’t bring himself to take another step. He leans against the wall.  
            Fitz approaches, and that’s when he realizes something is desperately wrong. Lotus Juice is nearly completely visible, not hiding in some non-water. It’s shriveled, browning a little. It doesn’t look healthy. The way that Fitz is having trouble standing doesn’t bode well, either.  
            “If one of us has to die, Jojo, it’s my duty to do so.” Fitz manages a shaky smile, a limp and slightly dry laying trembling on his hand. Xander sees it coming, knows that yet another person is going to sacrifice themselves so he can live on, unable to save any of them. He shakes his head, but that’s all he can manage. He’s telling his body to do things, to move, to jerk away, anything to stop Fitz from whatever he’s planning. It’s that feeling he had before with the mask, yelling at the person in the movie not to open the door, the monster’s on the other side, but this time even though Fitz can hear him, unlike that character in the movie, he’s not listening. “From a Speedwagon to a Joestar.”  
            Fitz has started coughing up blood, and Xander comes to the sickening realization that his ally had lied to him before. These aren’t just cuts. It’s internal bleeding, and they’ve been running around for hours while Fitz has been bleeding to death. Even as his hands heal completely, even as a bit of light and color return to the world as the Englishman pours every last remaining ounce of his strength into it, and Lotus Juice further withers as a soothing, sap-like substance leaks onto his hands, Speedwagon begins to slump.  
            Xander manages to find the strength from somewhere inside, forcing himself up off the ground where he’s lying. He’s not sure when that happened. He’s not sure when any of this happened. This can’t be the way this ends.  
            “Fitz. Fitz, please.” His vision blurs, and he thinks whatever it is is affecting him again, until he feels the wetness on his cheeks. He furiously wipes it away. He can’t miss this. He can’t mess this up. Not like everything else. “You’re my friend. You can’t…”  
            The slightest of smiles crosses the blond’s face, but his eyes fall shut, his breathing slowing.  
            He hears a strangled sob behind him, and turns to find the girl in the ratty jeans that he’d seen at the restaurant. She’s staring, uncomprehending, terrified, at Fitz’s body lying unmoving on the pavement. And beside her is something out of one of Giles’ books—a feathered, flying serpent at the girl’s side. He doesn’t recognize it. Not really.  
            Pretender does, and he’s just lost someone again, just been as useless as he’s been thinking ever since they ran into this Stand User. His Stand charges with a roar, throwing her into the wall. It’s not even bothering with the ‘Toratora’ thing anymore. The flying snake is charging him in desperation and anger, and he can feel the phantom pain as it bashes itself into his Stand again and again. His vision’s starting to blur again, this time with a reddish haze, and he’s losing himself in the sensation. It’d be so easy to hurt her, make her feel what pain is, how his friend must’ve died in agony.  
            His vision isn’t completely gone, though. It’s really weird, like he’s not exactly seeing it, but for whatever reason, he can see a little through his left eye. His very not-there left eye. It’s blurry, but it’s not covered in blood, and it’s telling him that the girl he’s holding, throwing again, is in pain and very scared and was genuinely shocked, genuinely horrified at what her Stand had done.  
            With an effort, he calls Pretender to him. He almost thinks his Stand won’t come, still too busy hurting the one who’d hurt his friend, an eye for an eye, but with a frustrated growl the Stand drops the girl and steps away, back to his side, and the street is just filled with two distinct sounds of gasping for breath.


	15. Violent Whispers: Stand Pic

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Same as chapter title. As always.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Yet another Stand pic. It took me forever to draw and color a simple picture, (which I then turned to grayscale...I dunno) and for that I'm sorry guys. (I'm going back to uni this weekend, which is ridiculous. I could give excuses, like the fact that I suddenly had an allergic reaction and stuff, but instead I'll just apologize and hope that I can at least get our heroes out of a cliffhanger before too long. However, it's school, so I'm not going to make any promises I might or might not be able to keep.)  
> So anyone has an idea, the color scheme usually matches the wild and wacky side of the world that Araki walks on. Which you can't see, because I've been turning them all grayscale. I dunno, maybe I thought that I'd include the colored versions when you actually have an idea of the powers? ...I might make that a separate file, like my background notes author thing that no one can see, and call it a Speedwagon Foundation File or something.

 


	16. The Beat of His Blood

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Xander's not helpless, and he's not just going to sit by as Fitz dies.

            The quiet is broken by hysterical babbling, but for a long-time acquaintance of Willow who’s seen her on caffeine, it’s a breeze to follow. “Nobody was supposed to get hurt!” she was insisting, tears in her eyes. “Well, at least, not that bad. Whisper’s never hurt anyone that bad before.” The flying snake’s calmed down, and suddenly it looks like a normal snake again, green with hardly a trace of feathers, and it’s not even flying anymore. The Stand—because who’s he kidding, that’s what it is, isn’t it—slithers back to her side, still a little agitated itself. At least it’s stopped attacking him. The blood’s stopped dripping from his forehead, and he can see again.  
            With his right eye, anyway. The vision from the empty socket on the left side has disappeared completely, an illusion in the desert. It’s not clear whether he was just hallucinating, or whether something was actually happening, but it’s not really important at the moment. The fires of the rage consuming him have begun to die down to smoldering embers. He can think again. Enough to listen to what she’s saying.  
            “But then, you were going to catch me and hurt me, and I just…I had to get away. And no one’s been that upset before!” She continues, cheeks drenched, but Xander tunes her out. He’s heard what he needs to work it all out. He’s not Giles, or Willow, but he can rub a few clues together and get sparks. He’s had enough experience with the supernatural to figure this stuff out, after all.  
            _So, it works on emotion. Calm, Jojo._  
            These aren’t just hands that have failed. These are hands that have helped his friends. These are hands that made Dawn hot chocolate in the aftermath of Glory and held Willow while her world was falling apart and served as backup for his family—because, really, what were they, by this point, if not family—as they saved the world. And these are hands that aren’t going to fail Fitz.  
            He’s calmer, more confident. The despair cleared off, a cloud on a windy day. His hands have stopped throbbing. He peels away the bloodstained bandages. There’s no trace of a wound underneath. He’d begun to heal, but judging by the fresh blood stains the cuts had opened, maybe even deepened, sometime very recently.  
            And yet now, the skin looks new.  
            “H-hey, Fitz.” He moves over to his friend, squats. “I’m okay now. Thanks to you.”  
            The bleeding instantly slows. That’s good and bad. Good, because it means that the Englishman is still partially conscious, which can only mean good things for his ability to survive if he’s helped in time. He’s not over the edge of the abyss yet. It’s good because bleeding doesn’t slow that quickly, not if it’s not magically related, or whatever Stands work off of, so it means he’s on the right track. And his friend can’t afford to lose too much more blood.  
            Bad, because Fitz is still at least partly unconscious, which means he’s lost enough blood that any slowing in the bleeding means that there’s a lot less blood to lose. It’s dangerous. Speedwagon needs help, right now.  
            _Use the Force, Xanman._  
            Great, what does that even mean. His brain really could be more useful sometimes. “Heal him.”  
            Nothing. The girl is crying. How old is she, anyway? “I don’t know how to heal him. I don’t know how to undo what Whisper’s done. Usually it’s not a problem, like I said. People don’t get that upset. It wears off after a while. And I got even more scared when you were following me on the bus, but you didn’t even look like you recognized me and didn’t make a scene or anything, so I thought maybe I was okay and you two were too, except you looked like you were dead inside and he was putting on a brave face but he was actually dying and…”  
            “Heal him.” A little of the anger returns. The cut above his eye begins bleeding, just a little, again. His words are sharp, impatient.  
And suddenly he’s exhausted. His eyelid starts drooping. It’s an effort to keep his eye open. What’s going on? He can’t afford to just keep falling asleep in dangerous situations like this. This hadn’t been a problem until—  
He opens his eyes. He’s kneeling in front of a Japanese pond with fish. A koi pond, part of his mind corrects him, and he doesn’t argue.  
The Pretender is kneeling across the pond, a knight’s sword at his side. Black eyes slowly turn up to meet his own. And suddenly he knows who’s responsible for this. He starts up with a snarl on his lips. “Fitz is out there, dying, and you think it’s the perfect time to sleep?! I’m not going to let him—”  
His Stand growls and gestures at the water. He glances down, and suddenly the waters aren’t crystal clear. They’ve clouded, for some reason, even though there’s nothing new in the water. Or the sky. He glances back up, again, to see his Stand drifting away as if he’s made of mist and is being blown away by some unfelt wind. He sees his own face staring back at him for a second before his Stand is completely gone. He glances back in the water. Who can he trust, if not himself, or a weird, power representation of himself, anyway? Pretender wants to save Speedwagon as much as he does.  
It’s the gentleman, the first guy he’d seen. Been. In dreams, of course, but…  
What Speedwagon was saying. Was this guy a Joestar? He has something other than blood to connect him, to give him a bloodline of which he can be proud.  
A guy with a cool moustache and hat at an angle that makes him wonder how, exactly, it’s being worn for two seconds before he realizes that’s irrelevant too, is explaining how he learned the Ripple. Running into a guy in an Indian village, healing someone. “To me, his hands looked as bright as the sun.”  
But it’s secondhand knowledge. He knows it’s possible, now, to heal with the Ripple, but he doesn’t have time to try to figure out how to get the energy to the proper frequency or whatever, rather than just knocking out or killing Fitz. He knows how to kill vampires and zombies with the power of the ripple, no problem. And he worked out how to use it to knock someone out, but…  
Okay, along those lines, the energy has to be in tune with, not conflict with, a person’s natural energy. As he’s working through this, he can see ripples in the pond in his mind, see them bouncing around.  
“The two ripples.” Okay, man, that sounds like torture. He’s getting images quickly, flipping through them for what he’s looking for, and…well, it’s not exactly right, but it’s a start. He honestly doesn’t see another way to go, and there isn’t really time. If he could work on that, improvise maybe.  
He needs to work in tandem with Fitz, to trick his body into doing the work, to restore the natural rhythms and blah blah blah. Honestly, the explanation doesn’t matter. He needs to do this. He feels what the guy—no, the Joestar feels—working in tandem with a partner. Synchronizing breathing, the pulse of life. Fitz saved him. The least he has to do is return the favor.  
            He opens his eyes, and it’s daylight again, and he’s kneeling in front of the blond. Who’s still breathing, but it’s shallow. He doesn’t have much time.  
            The girl is freaking out next to him. Gently but firmly he shoves her aside. They were both out for the count, and yet she didn’t kill them. If anything can, that shows she’s sincere. Which is good, but he can’t think about that, either. He needs absolutely nothing to break his concentration right now.  
            Just as firmly, he shoves aside the fear, the doubt. They’ll only hurt his concentration as well.  
            He stares at Fitz, trying to really see the guy. An obsessed guy who would die for a guy he just met, based on family connections. Someone who’s known loss. Heartbreak. Desperately searching for a place, for acceptance. Sarcastic and English when he’s comfortable.  
            He matches his breathing to the blond’s and places a hand on the wound on the chest. It’s sticky, but drying. That’s really not a good sign, but he refuses to think he might be too late. That thought has no place, like everything else. He can’t give this anything less than his best.  
            He gets a feel for the energy, and his hand starts to glow. There might be a gasp in the background, but he doesn’t really process it, pouring all his energy into the creation of this Ripple.  
            A hand tries to shove away his own. A change in breathing. He refuses to let his hand move, matching the new breathing pattern effortlessly. Only when he can feel the living energy of the body underneath his hand grow steady and strong does he remove his hand and blink, letting the world in again.  
            Green eyes meet his in wonder. “Welcome back, Fitz. Don’t you dare ever do that again. And don’t give me any crap about how you’re a Speedwagon and would die for a Joestar or any nonsense like that. You told me that neither of us were dying today. Which is right, but you don’t get to decide to ignore that, okay?”  
            The Englishman huffs in laughter, then nods. “We both live.”  
            "Much better.” They’re both exhausted, but it’s probably a good idea to have a conversation with the girl that’d nearly killed them. His stomach rumbles, and Fitz laughs in earnest at that. Maybe food should accompany the discussion, after all.


	17. Cry in the Sun

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Fitz and Xander escort the User of Violent Whispers to her home.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Well, here we are, the end of Volume III.  
> Warning: Darker chapter.

            It turns out that no one besides him is hungry, but he begs until Fitz gives him money to shut up. He hides a grin and buys a pastry. Maybe Willow would be yelling at him for not getting something nutritious at the moment, but that’s fine. He’s mostly just going for calories at the moment, anyway. He debates, then gets a super sweet coffee with extra shots of caffeine, just to stay awake. He’s starting to get a headache, but if he’s hyper, instead, it’ll go away. He’ll crash later, but it’s fine. It wouldn’t be the first time he’s missed sleep for a while, after all. Fitz, meanwhile, looks completely fine, but if you take a closer look you can see by the determination in his eyes that he’s still conscious by sheer willpower alone.  
            The girl doesn’t know how to react to the two of them, but then, that’s only to be expected. She’s still a little wary, but looks about ready to cry when Xander gets back with the food and he’s explaining, “We’ll at least escort you somewhere safe. We wouldn’t want you to get hurt, after all.” She clearly doesn’t want to hang around them, which is all right. It’s dangerous around them, after all.  
            She’d been so sure that they were going to hurt her. A cold dread settles into Xander’s gut, which he covers by taking a huge bite and chewing loudly.  
            The Englishman glances at him with a disgusted look. Good, he hadn’t gotten to the point he could see right through that, then. In an effort to distract the girl from the American barbarian, he asked her, “How long have you had a Stand?”  
            The girl looks confused, so Xander clarifies in a mumble that apparently no one can understand, crumbs spraying everywhere. He swallows, then repeats himself, “Whisper.”  
            “S-since I can remember. You’re not going to take him away, are you?” The snake-like Stand slithers just a little further from them, as if they’re going to jump it and try to snake-wrangle it into something that very second. Not like either of them really wanted to tangle with the Stand she called Whisper, but it appeared she hadn’t made that connection yet.  
            “Like we could,” Xander snorts. He’s distracted from the sudden hope in the kid’s eyes by Fitz stealing his coffee. He waits for the inevitable spew or “Jojo, that’s vile!”, but it doesn’t come. The blond shrugs and hands back the cup without comment, but there’s a spring in his step and the exhaustion has fallen away, just a little, so maybe he needed the caffeine too? He decides to resume the conversation as if it hadn’t happened, too. “Both you and Whisper clearly know how to handle yourselves, and we were pretty much at your mercy, so I think you kinda hold the cards right now.” Never mind the fact that it’s a Stand and can’t really be separated from her anyway.  
            As most teenagers, she’s slightly flattered by the respect she’s being shown, but deflates slightly at the mention of the fact that they’d nearly died. “I—I didn’t mean to hurt you. Not that much.”  
            She’d mentioned that, over and over, so clearly it was bothering her.  
            “Don’t worry about it. We’re tough, too.” Xander flexes, causing a waterfall of crumbles to tumble. She giggles, while Fitz looks on, bemused by their antics.  
            Eventually, he breaks in with a question that makes her freeze again. “Have you met others like us?”  
            She’s stuck in fight or flight mode, eyes not quite seeing the present. Xander sighs and hands his coffee and pastry to the blond, fixing him with a disappointed look. Then he crouches down so he’s not so large or intimidating. “Don’t worry about it. You don’t have to talk about it if you don’t want to.”  
            “I-I got away. Thanks to Whisper. He saved me, and he’s been with me ever since.” She’s quiet, but he hears her and smiles encouragingly.  
            “That’s good. But just because that time scares you doesn’t mean that you’re weak.” For once, it’s hard to come up with the right words, but this is important, so he forces through it and stills the tendency to babble. “That fear helped save you. But that doesn’t mean it has to define your life, either.” It won’t be easy, and it’ll never go further away, but there are better things in the world.  
            She looks back up. There are tears in her eyes, but by mutual silent agreement they all choose to ignore them. She’s smart enough to realize it’s not as simple as he’s putting it, but is choosing to overlook that for his sake. “Yeah, you’re right. Thanks.”  
            He shrugs and stands back up, taking back his food from a somewhat shocked Speedwagon. “So, are we actually headed somewhere, or would you rather…?” He lets her fill in the sentence—not go home, not have us see where you live, or something he can’t even predict.  
            She’s about to answer when an ambulance followed by a police car and a fire truck head past, sirens blazing, and she trembles, staring at it, having forgotten the question entirely. It turns down a street, and she’s still standing there, oblivious to the world.  
            “Hey,” Xander says, and she shoots off in the direction of the emergency. Xander swears and grabs the pastry from Fitz, stuffing the entire thing in his mouth and following at a pace he’d learned from surviving in Sunnydale.  
            They catch up to her talking to a police officer at a cordon. Tears are streaming down her face again. She’s a bit of a mess, after all of that, but it’s only to be expected. She actually looks young now.  
            Fitz follows shortly behind, downing the coffee in a huge gulp. Xander would complain, but this isn’t really the time and it was the blond’s money anyway. The evasiveness of the copper is a sign that they’re probably trying not to cause any more hysteria.  
            “What are we going to do?” he whispers.  
            “We can’t leave her like this,” Xander replies, which gets a sarcastic eye roll. “What happened, anyway?”  
            “I remember something my mother told me, a long time ago. ‘Stand users are drawn to Stand users.’” It’s not necessarily the case, but the bad feeling in Xander’s gut is agreeing with that statement. He keeps his voice low, but the police officer at the cordon is rather occupied by the kid crying. Still, there’s his partner, plus the firemen and the paramedics to dodge. They probably can’t get in to see the body. “I think they’d notice if they suddenly all fell asleep. Probably draw the conclusion that someone used some sort of sleeping gas, but it’d probably draw too much attention.”  
            “So, Lotus Juice is out.” He hasn’t experimented, but Pretender probably can’t go to that range. And he refuses to make the girl send in Whisper. She doesn’t need to see that. And as for sneaking in themselves…well, someone would definitely notice.  
            The girl starts walking away, and they make it a few blocks before she rushes Xander, beating him with fists that have all the strength of an exhausted kitten. It’s not the first time he’s held someone as their world collapsed, but this time he’s much more gentle with his hug. Given some of her responses, she’s not the biggest fan of touch. “They were horrible people,” she laughs. “So why am I crying?”  
            The coldness of those green eyes sends shivers down Xander’s spine. It reminds him of the look his friend had in his eyes when he declared the one who’d killed his mother would die. But he agrees with the determination as Fitz declares, “I know a few people. We will find out what happened. And we’ll protect you.”  
            “But why? You don’t know me!” she protests, tears beginning to dry.  
            “We’re nosy and stubborn like that.” He gets a slight smile at that, which was his goal all along.


End file.
